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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/29970774">Knives Down</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/anomalation/pseuds/anomalation'>anomalation</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Sharp Edges [3]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Knives Out (2019)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Arguing as love language, F/M, Gen, I don't know why they insist on it being Alicia when it's Alice in the film, I have beef with IMDB, Internal Conflict, Power Outage, Unbetaed we die like men, enemies to in-laws</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-03-11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-03-11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-16 03:09:00</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>6,425</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/29970774</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/anomalation/pseuds/anomalation</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>He should be dead and Alice should’ve killed him. Instead, they were the best team in Pictionary in the history of all time. No contest.</p><p>Or, Alice realizes something about her sister's boyfriend.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Alice Cabrera &amp; Marta Cabrera, Alice Cabrera &amp; Ransom Drysdale, Marta Cabrera/Ransom Drysdale</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Sharp Edges [3]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1577185</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>39</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>215</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>i will never die</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Knives Down</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Finally worked up a part three in this universe :) Thank you all for the wonderful comments that kept me thinking about these characters.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>Alice had never liked a single person Marta had ever gone on a date with. Never had, never would - that’s what she told Marta for basically forever. Nobody deserved her beautiful, radiant compassionate genius of a sister. Not one single person. Especially not the asshole that tried to kill her - definitely not that entitled piece of shit. He was lucky to be out of jail, doubly lucky Marta even spared a thought for him while he was in there, and incalculably lucky that she would take him to shit like board game bars or nights out. So it was really another kind of thing when it came to Marta and Ransom, present day. Like that guy that got struck by lightning a dozen times. That was Ransom, with all of the chances Marta gave him.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He should be dead and Alice should’ve killed him.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Instead, they were the best team in Pictionary in the history of all time. No contest. Well, not as good as Ransom and Marta. They were so frighteningly psychic that they weren’t allowed to be a team anymore. Meg was fighting for the same rule to be applied to Alice and Ransom - not because they were that good at it, but because they were so loud either way. Not that there was anything wrong with being loud, but yeah, Alice could admit she was being loud.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Are you fucking kidding me with this shit,” she yelled basically in Ransom’s face.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He smiled back at her for a fraction of a second before he matched her tone and yelled back. “That was so clearly a hailstorm,” he said, pointing at his shitty drawing that looked like rain mostly, and snow maybe but definitely not hail. “Are you blind? Can you not see?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“There is nothing wrong with my vision, buddy,” Alice began, getting officially All Fired Up, which was when Marta intervened. She did that when they got too heated, got involved because she claimed they were stressing her out. Stressing Meg out, more like, which like - Alice barely cared about. Meg could cry herself a river, as far as Alice was concerned, but whatever. The peace was kept.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She’d rather be paired with Ransom than any of Marta’s other friends, anyways. They were all awful drawers, for starters, and also prone to take it personally if she was too upset about them getting something wrong. At least Ransom liked to be yelled at. Or if he didn’t, he pretended to.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>That was something Alice hadn’t thought about much, but it did occur to her tonight, with everybody else around, the way Ransom was different. Not just from Marta’s other boyfriends, but all of the people Marta knew altogether. None of them were anything like Ransom. None of them liked it when Alice got loud, for starters; she’d been basically uninvited from game nights before he came around. So that was what Alice was thinking about right now.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She was not thinking about how Ransom sat down right next to Marta. Like, right next to her. That was relatively new, the two of them acknowledging that they were a couple in public. They’d been dating for a whole year, at this point, like, fucking glaciers moved faster than the two of them. That was all Marta, cautious and a little repressed. But the thing that really knocked Alice off her balance was that Ransom went along with it. Ransom, spoiled rich little bitch who never knew a single moment of discomfort his whole fucking life, who said wack shit because he’d never faced a single consequence for anything - that’s the guy that was following Marta’s lead and taking things at her speed. The guy that hung on her every word and did whatever she asked. The same guy that had tried to put a knife through her heart, for that matter, but bring that up to Marta and she’d just roll her eyes. As if that wasn’t a big deal. And every time they sat next to each other, Alice thought about the knife that had almost taken her sister from her, and she thought about how the guy that did it was actually almost kind of her friend.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>So, yeah. Color Alice a little conflicted. It was understandable that she didn’t want to think about it. That just got a little harder, once they were doing things like holding hands in public. His arm was over the back of Marta’s chair, and she was leaning into him, and Alice couldn’t tell who was more stupid, her for remembering what he’d done or Marta for forgetting.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Well, except that it was definitely Marta. No question.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ransom was worst when he kind of sweet sometimes, in his rich douche way. He’d pick up a round of drinks for all of them - for the family, Thrombeys and Cabreras. That was nice, even if it was on Marta’s card. But it was Ransom who remembered what they liked and who delivered them all their drinks with a smile.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Obnoxiously, it was also Ransom who seemed to actually enjoy Alice with no caveats.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She wished so hard that she didn’t like him too. She wished it up until the moment she found herself arguing with him, passionately, against Marta on what a persimmon looked like. In the end, a persimmon looked like an orange and not like a pomegranate and he was right. But of course he was right. Rich piece of shit. Alice flipped him off when he won and pivoted to arguing that it really was more like a sweet tomato, which made him so mad he smiled.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He was probably smiling when he tried to stab Marta. Alice stopped having fun when she thought of that, stopped arguing, and waited for the night to be over.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The most unbearable part of the situation - there were like fifty, but this really was the worst - was how Ransom noticed when she got mad. Noticed, and tried to fix it with shitty jokes until she snapped at him for real. Then he sat back, and didn’t say anything, and Alice couldn’t decide if she was more pissed or more guilty.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It wasn’t exactly the nicest behavior. To be so hot and cold with him. That wasn’t totally fair to another human being, Alice knew that. But god, she couldn’t help it.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He tried to kill Marta! Her only and favorite sister! And now he thought he got to just take her with him to protect his own payday, after that? Unbelievable. He could put up with exactly whatever she ended up doing to him, and he should consider himself lucky she hadn’t skinned him alive. Yet. She wasn’t saying that would never happen. He better be keeping his head on a swivel.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It was still a new kind of thing, that he was off probation and could stay out however long he wanted. Alice actually liked the shift, though, because when Ransom had to go early that meant Marta was going too. Now she got whole nights with her sister, at the low cost of having to drive home with them. Meg was headed back to the city, so tonight it was just her and them. Lovebirds. Ew. Alice was sitting shotgun, looking out the window as the two of them talked about Marta’s friends. Whatever. Alice was tired, and she didn’t want to joke around with him even still. Even if he was right about how Marta’s one friend Alex looked like the dude from Wizards of Waverly Place. He just didn’t know the name of him, so they negotiated that for a while. And Alice just kept looking out the window, even though she knew exactly who David Henri was and could’ve told them.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Marta loved to say people were complicated. That was probably something that helped her, trying to care about all these old white assholes who could afford a live-in medical assistant. It probably helped her care about Harlan, even, who was by all accounts kind of an awful person until Marta came along. He raised a family incapable of communicating with each other, who treated relationships like business deals, and then he found his conscience in the last year of his life and Alice was supposed to empathize with him? No. Sorry, and it probably seemed deranged to take this stance because he was dead, but no. Not sympathetic.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ransom, though. Maybe she had a point about Ransom. Because if Alice was thinking about whatever his primary trait was, complicated pretty much summed it up. He was a thoughtful asshole. A privileged rich kid who also understood what it was like to be a felon. The product of nepotism who hated his family, no exceptions. It was just… a lot.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Alice,” Marta said, and Alice tuned back in.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Hmm.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Did you have fun tonight?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yeah,” Alice said. “Are you glad you saw everybody? I know it’s been a while.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Her sister smiled, small and contented. “Yes,” she said. “I am. It was a great time. I’m glad you came.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Are you sure?” Alice said. She couldn’t help herself. “I know most of those nerds would prefer I wasn’t there.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ransom answered, not Marta. “Then they don’t know how to have a good time,” he said, his voice light.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Hence why I like my friends,” Alice said, and then realized it didn’t sound like she was joking. “No, I had fun,” she added then, to overcompensate. “Even if someone has never seen an orchid before.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It’s an abstract concept,” Ransom said. “Sue me, for not having an architectural cross-section of orchid petal shape on hand.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>That was pretty good. It was funny. Unfortunately, Alice remembered that she was mad at him right then and she didn’t say anything in response. It didn’t come easy to her, silence. She wanted to have it all out. But everything about this was so much, so beyond anything she’d ever felt before, and Alice looked for words and found them lacking. For once in her fucking life.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The house Marta lived in was starting to feel more like hers, which was why it was probably feeling more like home. She planted beautiful lush bushes all down the drive, surrounded the house with a garden that made it look more cottage than lair. Ransom still gave it a look, every time he saw it for the first time, a thought he kept having. Today, Alice couldn’t help but push. “Lot of memories here?” she said as they got out.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Shitty ones,” Ransom answered. “Yeah.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Not only shitty, I hope,” Marta said from the other side of the car. Lovestruck fool.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Well, there’s a definite upward trend,” Ransom answered. They couldn’t even see each other, but looking at him it was obvious how he was connected to Marta anyways. They were basically quantum entangled at this point. And then he looked at Alice, and she had to wonder if he was seeing her with Marta’s eyes or his own.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It was unbearable. Alice rolled her eyes and slammed the door, and went for the house. She had just about ran out the clock on the amount of time she could spend with him without losing her mind.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And then the power went out. Alice was in her pajamas, brushing her teeth, when the lights all died. She waited, for a second. Sometimes on these windy nights, it would flicker. But the lights didn’t come back on, so Alice rinsed her mouth out and then leaned out the door and shouted. “Marta?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’m getting candles,” Marta called back.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>So Alice finished washing her face by the light of her phone screen, and then also put her hair up. Maybe she could just go to bed, that would probably be fine.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Of course the old man had candelabras, tons of them. Marta came for Alice with one held high in her hand, five candles lighting the way and Ransom behind her with boxes in his arms. “We’re going to the study,” Marta said. “Want to come?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Sure,” Alice said. Because an evening by firelight with her sister sounded fun, like the kind of fun you don’t get to have as an adult that much. Sure, she could put up with Ransom for a little longer.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It was a bit of a process, to get the fire going in the fireplace and then to bring some chairs over to cuddle up. It wasn’t winter yet, but it was definitely late in fall and the house would get cold soon, without power. But by the time they got everything set up, Alice had too much invested in this to leave after like a half hour. So she wrapped a blanket tight around her, and girded her goddamn loins.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Didn’t the old man have a generator?” Ransom asked, settling in on the couch. Marta was lighting a few more candles, saving some for later just in case.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“No,” Marta said. “He said he liked the romance of blackouts.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“That sounds just like him,” Ransom said about the guy he almost successfully murdered. Would’ve, were it not for Marta’s incredible competence. So the thing that was fucking wack was how much Ransom sounded like he loved Harlan anyways.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yeah,” Alice said. “It’d sure be nice if he was here, huh?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Marta gave her a look. “I’m getting wine,” she said, and left.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And like, it’s not like Marta was usually keeping them apart but it was pretty unusual for them to be totally alone for any amount of time.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ransom, of course, broke the silence. Asshole. “I’m beginning to think you’re slightly perturbed,” he said.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Smug piece of shit. “Maybe,” Alice said.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Any reason you’re not already yelling about it?” Ransom pushed further.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Maybe I don’t feel like yelling.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Doesn’t seem likely.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He was right, goddamn him. “Why do you want me to?” she asked, keeping her voice carefully modulated. “Doesn’t make a ton of sense.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Well, I’m kind of used to it,” he said, which was charming but not an answer. He excelled at that. Almost like he had a whole childhood of schmoozing and ass kissing to lean on - the reason Alice thought she should basically never trust him under any circumstances. “Seriously,” he added. “What was it? Do we have an ass to kick?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I think I’m good,” Alice said witheringly, staring into the fire.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ransom’s eyes were on her, she felt it, but she didn’t look back. “Alice,” he said then. “We both know I’m capable of annoying it out of you, but I’d really like to pretend I’ve grown out of that behavior, so. Can you just say it? Come on.”  </span>
</p><p>
  <span>And that didn’t work. It didn’t. Alice just decided to have it all out. It was too much work not to. “Why are you pushing this, asshole? You’re really so eager to hear it? That I can’t look at you sometimes because you almost put a knife in my sister’s heart? Because I’ll say it if I have to motherfucking say it, but I don’t know why you’re pushing this when you’re the last person I’d expect to get how I feel.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It was rare, that she actually put Ransom back on his heels. He could meet any taunt that she threw with one better, or a smile, or an eyebrow raise. A savant at taking insults without being thrown. But when she said that, she saw for the first time a Ransom that she’d actually affected. Made him feel bad, specifically. And nobody was more surprised than Alice to discover she fucking hated it. It wasn’t satisfying at all. It just felt like shit.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>There was a long, tense silence. The fire crackled. “Okay,” Ransom said after a second, and then he said nothing else.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>God. Alice didn’t expect him to be so quiet. She thought he’d fight back.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“For what it’s worth,” he finally said. “I do get it.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Sure you do,” she said.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ransom just huffed out a little laugh - much more normal. “Not a huge fan of mirrors these days,” he said, and then Marta came back with wine glasses and a couple bottles.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“We should call the electric company,” she said as she came towards them. “If we don’t get power back soon.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Neither of them answered, for a moment. “Definitely,” Ransom eventually said, but it was too late. Marta had caught on.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What happened?” she asked them both, and then turned to Alice. “What did you say?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Nothing,” Ransom answered for her.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Alice frowned at him. “You don’t cover for someone once you’re caught,” she said. “Then it’s free reign to tattle.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’m not covering for you,” he said. Didn’t even seem like he knew he was lying, which was - uh. Then what did he think he was doing? Jesus. “You just told the truth,” he added, which was a fucking bummer. Alice wasn’t used to feeling bad about being right. It wasn’t an experience she was interested in repeating, honestly.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“And what would that be?” Marta demanded.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“That he almost killed you,” Alice said. “And I don’t know how I’m supposed to fucking deal with that.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“And that came up now? For whatever reason?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It comes up,” Alice said crossly, “all the fucking time, for me. Ransom just picked at me tonight and made me talk about it.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ransom didn’t object to that either. He had his hand over his mouth, and it was his turn to avoid eye contact by looking at nothing in particular. Whatever. Let him sulk.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Marta poured them all wine, pushed a glass into Alice’s hand and then brought the other two to the couch for her and Ransom. Then, because this was probably technically in private, she curled up right next to him, leaning on his shoulder. And like, how could she do that? How could she touch him? It was fucking unfathomable. Alice looked at her sister’s hand on Ransom’s shoulder and wished she could douse him in acid with her thoughts.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You’re still bothered by that?” Marta asked eventually, her voice soft.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Please, please, please do not make this a me problem,” Alice began.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’m not,” Marta said, and Alice trusted her so she shut up. “I’m not, I just thought you’d gotten over it. Since the two of you get along like a house on fire.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Right. That was the thing, wasn’t it. Alice pressed her lips together tightly, and she couldn’t look at them anymore. “Well,” she said. “I don’t think we really do.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Oh, come on,” Marta rolled her eyes.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ransom didn’t roll his eyes. He looked like he was going to believe Alice and take her at her word, which was stupid beyond words. Had no one ever lied to him? Had no one ever been a little too nervous to say the truth? Christ. What a life he must’ve lived. “Of course,” he said, and had a sip of his wine. “It was always more of a volume thing.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Is that what it is?” Marta inquired, the sharpness hidden in her tone. “I don’t remember you having that with that many other people.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Traitor. Alice glared at her. “Well, I’m not exactly an easy personality.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Neither is he,” Marta scoffed.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Right, but I’d hope to be slightly more personable than the classist silver spoon dickhead.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ransom huffed out half a laugh. “Slightly,” he agreed.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Among normal people,” Alice amended.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Normal for you.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Normal for everybody but the children of New England royalty.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The fire cracked and popped, and Ransom looked over at her. “New money,” he said. “Not royalty.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Does that matter?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“No.” He shrugged, which made that actually and secretly a yes. “Hey,” he added then. “I’m not asking you to cry for us. The nouveau riche. It’s not some great tragedy. But.” He looked into the fire then, and stopped himself.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>This was fucking new, huh? Ransom saying something he wasn’t totally sure of. Alice couldn’t remember it happening before. She wasn’t totally sure what to do. So she drained her glass of wine, and pulled her feet up into the chair. “So what’s your point?” she finally said when she got back to the start of the conversation. “I’m a huge bitch and no one likes me? Thanks.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Never said no one likes you,” Marta said with a smile that softened it. “Alice, I’m just saying. You’re-“</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I know what you’re just saying,” Alice relented. “Yeah.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Marta approved of that; they made eye contact and shared a warm look. Okay. They were on the same page. Alice should hear her out. She stayed quiet, and waited for her sister to begin again.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ransom spoke up, though. Fucking Ransom. “Could someone fill me in, then? On what’s being said? I don’t have the Cabrera family telepathy, that hasn’t kicked in yet.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Comes with the name change,” Marta told him, and Ransom nodded understandingly.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“We’re saying,” Alice said, “that you and me, we… vibe.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“We vibe,” Ransom repeated, raising his eyebrows.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yeah. I mean it doesn’t excuse how you tried to kill my sister, but.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Marta pointed at her - she was taking a sip when Alice talked, and said when she could, “That. There. That’s what you have to talk about.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I don’t want to fucking talk about it,” Alice said. Her heart seized in her chest. “I almost…” The silence was too loud, some of the analog clocks ticking away on the walls. God. They were just waiting for her. “Lost you,” she said at last, but what she meant was you almost took her.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yeah, we’ve mentioned this. Seems kind of hard to get over that,” Ransom said, mainly to Marta. “Seems like the kind of grudge it makes sense to hold forever.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Talk to her,” Marta insisted, and turned his head with her finger so Ransom was looking right at Alice. He had the trace of a smile on his face, but he wasn’t happy at all.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Hi,” Ransom said to Alice.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Good evening,” she replied.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I don’t expect you to forgive me,” he said.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Okay. Good. Because I get that you’re not really friends with any of your family, but Marta’s my favorite person in the world most of the time and I can’t handle… you could’ve…”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ransom was nodding. “I know,” he said. “I regret it.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Great,” Alice said with sarcasm that hurt in her chest, and they fell silent again. She leaned forward and poured herself another glass.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Marta stepped in with a gentle prod. “So that’s what you’re upset about,” she said.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Fucking yeah!” Alice snapped.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Okay!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Hey,” Ransom said. His arm was up over the back of the couch, around Marta so protectively. Honestly, where did he even get off doing that? How could he even pretend to care about her wellbeing? Or, worse - he could mean it. Alice’s stomach flipped. “I get it,” Ransom said. “I just don’t understand why you’re…”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Why I’m what?” Alice snapped after a long pause, already defensive, and she looked at her sister. “You’re not stupid. So why the hell are you acting like it? Nothing he could ever do could make him deserve-”</span>
</p><p>
  <span> “I know,” Marta said. “It’s not about deserving.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Alice groaned so deeply. “Jesus Christ,” she said. “Don’t make this one of these fucking Saint Marta moments.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You’re lucky Mama isn’t here to hear you taking the Lord’s name in vain,” Marta said mildly.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Saint Marta?” Ransom asked. His voice was a little delicate. Like maybe he wouldn’t push if she told him to fuck off.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“She loves to pick a cross to hang herself on,” Alice said. “Especially one no one’s asked her to. And like I said.” She looked at Marta to gauge her opinion as she said this next part. “Well. Nothing better than forgiving your own killer, huh?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Marta made a face, but didn’t protest. In fact, she just looked at Ransom. And Ransom smiled back. “Oh. Y’know,” he said to her. “The exact thing I’ve said to you.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I knew it sounded familiar,” Marta said.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Why are you arguing against yourself, asshole?” Alice demanded of him. “Do you not know how to win a fight?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Not a fair fight,” he said. And then Ransom moved, quick and confident. He sat forward, filled his wineglass up twice as full and then chugged it like he was at a fucking frat party. Once that was done, he looked Alice in the eye. Firelight flickered over the one side of his face, and at one point she would’ve found that dangerous-looking. But it was just strangely intimate, now. Raw. “You’re right,” he said. Some of her favorite words - he had to know that by now. “I’m not friends with any of my - hell, I don’t think anyone in my family even likes me. Maybe Meg. But I’ve been a dick to her, so who knows. Working on that.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Marta rolled her eyes. “Meg likes you.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Maybe,” Ransom said.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Definitely,” Alice informed him. “And obviously.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>This was not what Ransom wanted to hear. “Whatever,” he said. “I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing here, is the point.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“With me?” Alice asked.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“With any of this. With you, with Meg. With you,” he added to Marta quietly. “I don’t know what I’m doing. Haven’t learned. So if there’s something I could do, to make this…” He fell frustratedly, impotently silent.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What, okay?” Alice prompted after a moment.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He was shaking his head the moment she opened her mouth. “No, no. I know I can’t do that. But.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>But. Yeah. Still, here he was making the offer to do something. Something that might make this okay. Because he wanted her to not be mad, and because he didn’t know what to do with family. And he said he didn’t know how to win a fight - now, though, Alice was thinking maybe he didn’t want to. What was it he said? Not a huge fan of mirrors.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Sure they like you,” Alice said.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Marta made a face. Interestingly, Ransom didn’t. “What the fuck gives you that impression?” he said flatly.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Them taking your side when you killed your grandpa, for starters,”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Now that made Ransom mad. What all of her yelling hadn’t done, she’d just done. The moment she realized she’d done it, she thought better of it - less than ideal to piss off a felon and murderer, probably, right? Alice didn’t look away though, she let Ransom look her in the eye and be mad and tried to be mad right back.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“That was pure selfish instinct,” he said. “Something they’ve got in spades.” Moodily, he looked into the fire when he said that.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Sometimes, Alice really couldn’t stand him. “So your family didn’t love you enough and you ended up doing crimes that you didn’t really mean to do and now you don’t have the emotional tools to make it up to us?” she couldn’t help but say. “Seriously? That’s your case?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“That’s my case,” Ransom said, with the sharp kind of smile she was more familiar with. Even if now, it was a little closer to angry than she was used to. Christ. He was so eminently hateable, Alice wanted to scream. She always sort of wanted to - that was at the heart of most of their relationship, after all. Her yelling at him and him yelling back, matching the volume but not the hostility.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He’d never be good enough for Marta. Literally never. He’d be the last person to ever be good enough for her. The thing, though, was that Alice was starting to think no one would be good enough for Marta. Which didn’t mean she should settle for a murderer, but. It was a little easier to accept in the context of knowing anyone would be settling.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Kind of a circulcal argument you just had,” Marta said quietly, and pulled Ransom back towards her, so she could hold him.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Circular kind of issue,” Ransom said. “Things have a way of returning to my murder attempt. Funny how that works.” And for once, Alice let herself believe he meant the self-loathing. It made her like him more.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>They stayed by the fire until the power came on early in the darkness of the morning. Alice slept curled up in her chair, covered in a blanket. Marta slept on Ransom’s chest. She felt safe here, obviously, Alice noted with a kind of bitterness in her heart. Or maybe it wasn’t even bitterness. Maybe it was just fear, muted by guilt. She liked her sister’s murderer. What did that make her?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>When the lights came on around four, they split up for bed. Alice followed the other two up the steps, saw Ransom’s hand on her sister’s back when she stumbled on a step, and it fucking sucked. Alice had to admit that she knew for a fact that he loved her. Despite all of everything he did, this guy loved her sister and knew exactly what he was getting that he didn’t deserve. More than anything, that just made Alice exhausted.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Hey,” Ransom said from behind her, as she split from the two of them to head for her room.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Goodnight,” Alice said without turning around.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She was up in just a few hours anyways. Her sleep was restless. Shit was stirred up, to say the very least. And when she woke up, she sat up and looked around her room for a second. It hadn’t always been her room. It was a guest room that Ransom’s mom had stayed in, before. She’d thrown out most of that shit when they were moving in - or given it to Marta, who had probably kept it to torture herself over.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And like, okay, while she was being introspective for a second, Alice thought about Ransom. As a human being and her probable eventual brother-in-law, as a complicated person. His family didn’t like him. Who could blame them, her gut said, but on a second and more charitable look, she had to acknowledge how much that would suck. Alice couldn’t empathize with that, really - her mom and her sister had always had her back. In an annoying way more than anything else, really. But she had it, and he hadn’t and Alice thought about how he said he didn’t know how to win a fair fight. Didn’t seem to know how to win one at all, honestly. So it seemed like it was more that he didn’t know how to win a fight fairly. Without stabbing someone, maybe.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Asshole.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She got up and headed down the stairs. The ones up to Marta’s room were still unavoidably creaky, but Alice had perfected getting down the others with no rogue noises. This house was sort of generally creaky, and not in a fun ghost way but in the way where the house was just old. At least it was warm now. It was kind of nice in here now that Marta had her way with the place. Homey.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The kitchen was as luxe as the rest of the place, so Alice had three different options for coffee. She went for the french press this morning. Maybe she was still holding a grudge against against the concept of electricity.  Maybe she just liked the ceremony of the whole thing. Both, probably. So she was sitting waiting to move the plunger down when she heard creaking coming towards her and Ransom joined her.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Hey,” he said.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She nodded, not in the mood to talk yet. Luckily, he didn’t seem to be either.  Just leaned against the counter next to her and crossed his arms. “Enough to share?” he asked, and she nodded again.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The first couple minutes were rough. Alice was waiting for him to reopen last night’s conversation. But after she had her cup of coffee, when Ransom was pouring his, Alice got impatient.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“So are you all hung up on this now?” she said.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ransom raised his eyebrows and didn’t look up. “On you being hung up on me trying to kill your sister?” he asked pleasantly.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yeah.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Little bit,” he said, tilting his head to one side.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“That’s stupid,” Alice said.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And Ransom didn’t come back at her then, either. He went to the fridge for cream, used it and put it back and then had a sip, and after all of that he looked at her. “What are you trying to say?” he said seriously.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I don’t want to rehash that with you,” Alice shrugged. “I feel like we know where we stand, I’m done talking about it.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Are you done talking about it, or are you just done for now?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I don’t know.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Well, I’d like to have some idea.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Duh. Of course he did. But the thing was him actually saying it. Alice chewed on her lip, her mug cradled in both hands. “Okay,” she said.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Okay,” he repeated slower.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I can’t forgive you,” she said. All of a sudden she was feeling defensive. “Even for her, I can’t.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I would never ask you to.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It sucked, being reasonably certain that he meant it. Alice hated it. “But,” she said, and then wished she hadn’t because she had to finish the thought. “There’s the other part. The part you don’t get.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“At least not until I change my name,” he said obligingly.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>God. Ransom Cabrera. Alice couldn’t think that much about it. “Right,” she said. “Well. We do… you and me are the same kind of troublemaker.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Same sense of humor.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Whatever,” Alice said. She couldn’t look at him any longer. “Yeah. And that’s… not nothing.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He didn’t say anything to that. Tilted his head and looked at her again, and then pointedly didn’t. “You’re going to have to give me a little more to go on,” he said. “And I’m not trying to give you a hard time.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“No, I know what that sounds like,” Alice said, and they shared a new kind of smile. She paced a few steps further from him, turned and regarded him from this distance.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He was still annoyingly handsome, tall and built and square-jawed. That New England boy look. Alice couldn’t say she was totally ignorant of the appeal. But she tried to see him a little differently this time. As an only child with a hell of a deescalation tool box and an aversion to sincerity. She had to yell at him for like, years to get him here. Because she wasn’t Marta and he had no guilt over getting stabbed giving them an emotional short-cut. Alice thought she had the better end of that potential deal.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I like you,” Alice said, because she thought that was probably a good place to start. “Against all fucking odds, dude. I do. So are we going to make this work, or what? I’ll try not to always hang it over your head if you promise to never make an attempt on my sister’s life again.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Easy promise on my end,” he said, in a tone Alice would probably describe as flippant if this conversation wasn’t strangely tense.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Well. Good. Music to my ears,” Alice said. She leaned over the counter and had a sip of her coffee then, and tried to think of something normal to say to get them out of this weird serious rut. “I want to be your best man,” was what ended up coming out. Boy.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ransom was genuinely surprised by that. She knew because he didn’t react at all. “Excuse me?” he said.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>So she had to double down. “When you and Marta get married, I want to be your best man. I think I deserve to be both best man and maid of honor, with all I’ve put up with here,” she said with a depressingly strong sense she actually meant it on some level. “Plus, who else would you pick? Like, Jacob?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Over 21 only,” Ransom said.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Alice snorted into her coffee. “Wise rule.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I could pick Meg.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Boo.” She made a fart sound. “Lame. Dumb. She’s still scared of you.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ransom’s eyes on her had weight to them this time. “What, and you’re not?” he said.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She should’ve seen that coming. “Oh, should I be?” she asked. “You want me to be afraid you’ll put a knife through my clavicle? Or am I supposed to fear your prodigious wit? Because let me tell you, not a ton there. You’ve been lied to, by whatever parent told you you’re talented and gifted.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It was a teacher, actually,” Ransom said. “My parents couldn’t tell you where I want to college, let alone high school.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Where’d you go to high school?” Alice asked, and then clarified. “I know you went to Harvard. it’s part of why I find you so despicable.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ransom flicked her a look, annoyed and disgustingly knowing. “Okay,” he said then. “Alright. That’s your game? Trick me into telling you shit so you can use it against me?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Well, certainly the first part,” Alice said.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He didn’t know what to do with that, clearly. Sipped his coffee and kept his mouth shut, and pretty soon Marta joined them so Alice expected that part of their conversation to be over. She let her guard down, like an idiot, and got caught up thinking about her final semester, which was almost half over but not close enough to done, honestly. She had a final project to work on today, and when Marta made more coffee Alice topped up her cup to go be productive.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Hey, Alice,” Ransom said when she was almost out of the room.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You’d have to throw my bachelor party,” he said. “And my standards are high.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Alice turned to look at him, and found him smirking at her warmly. Marta looked pleasantly confused. “Um, luckily my standards are even fucking higher,” Alice said after a second. “You won’t even be able to handle the quantity and quality of strippers I’ll provide.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Hold on, what?” Marta asked.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ransom ignored her for the moment. “I’ll hold you to that,” he said to Alice.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Do,” Alice challenged him.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“The job is yours,” he said. Which was really a two-fold confirmation - that they were cool and that he was planning on proposing at some point pretty soon. But Alice didn’t remark on any of that. She made her exit, and began to brainstorm the most depraved bachelor party she could think of for the brother-in-law she was discovering she didn’t really hate as much as she expected to. Given the murderer thing.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Like, yeah he didn’t deserve Marta. But it wasn’t like Alice did either.</span>
</p><p> </p>
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